Early New Year's Resolution? Finding Love

Last Saturday night, I decided it was a good time to get an early jump on a handful of my 2013 new year’s resolutions. I sat blurry-eyed and drunk on a late-night home-bound train, both sad and elated at having just a few hours earlier, ended a serious relationship.

When I woke up with a headache and that every-so-slight glassy-eyed look of someone ready to cry at the drop of a hat, I realized this new year’s resolution was a variation on a recurring theme in my resolution making.

January 1st is the universally accepted date of renewal — the calendar starts afresh and we get to put behind all the foibles of the year(s) past. As we embrace the new calendar, we make lists of resolutions, of self-made promises to motivate us through the next 365 days. Sometimes, it seems right to start on those resolutions a little earlier. And what better time to get a jump on New Year’s Resolutions than at the end of an old relationship?

My custom before setting goals for the new year is to flip through old notebooks and diaries searching for records of New Year’s Resolutions past, evaluating my success and accepting my shortcomings. There were a number of constants over the years, namely the universal standards:

Lose weight.Find Love.Write a book.Clean basement.Find inner peace… Optional and for extra credit: join movement to bring about World Peace.

It occurred to me that “Find Love” was the most challenging of the goals.

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This article was originally published at Single Warehouse. Reprinted with permission from the author.